Comparing Sports Betting To Other Gambling Types

There are many types of gambling available to the avid gambler on the internet. Some have a better probability of a winning outcome than others. I reckon that sports betting offers a better chance of winning than most other forms of gambling. Let’s have a look at some of those others before we compare it to sports betting.

  • Lotteries: The probability of winning any given lottery all depends on how many numbers are in the draw and how many winning numbers you need to to win the lottery. Take our Saturday XLotto as an example. You need to get 6 numbers right out of 45 numbers. Your chances of winning that lottery is 1 in 8,145,060! You can work out the chanced of winning any given lottery at WebMath. Yet millions of people buy lottery tickets every day. Why? Because the initial investment is minimal and because you never know if the next ticket you buy will be the winning one.
  • Slot Machines: The odds in winning the jackpot in slot machines, or pokies as they’re known over here, is even worse. According to this article it’s one in 17 million! There’s also this rumour where the payout is just around the corner. So if you can get on one that hasn’t had a win in a while you have more chance in winning. Well, according to this site that is utter bullshit. I don’t know what it is, perhaps its the lights and sounds, but some players get quite addicted to playing the pokies losing all their money on them.  :no-no:
  • Poker (Texas Hold’Em): Not as bad as the lotteries or the pokies but poker doesn’t offer the best odds for the casual punter.

Sports Betting And The Probability Of Winning

Sports Betting Probability

When talking about sports betting I’m referring to those sports where there are only two teams playing. Like soccer, AFL, NFL, hockey, tennis and the like. Even if you know absolutely nothing about any particular sport you have a 50/50 chance of winning. I have found in soccer though that there are times when you think you’ve won but you actually lost. I wrote about it in the post When A Win Is Not A Win. Soccer is weird that way. In soccer you can even increase your chances of winning by taking advantage of the double chance bet.

Usually though in sports betting either one team wins or the other one does. That is unless of course they draw in which case everyone loses except for the bookies. Kind of like flipping a coin and it lands on its edge.

The good thing about sports betting is that knowing the all the ins and outs of the game, the teams and the venues etc give the smart punter even more of a winning chance. So that 50/50 probability can be tipped in the punters favour. Unfortunately in gambling nothing is 100%. That is why there’s always a chance of an upset when sports betting. This is why you need to be a responsible gambler and never bet more than you can lose.